The Trouble with Tribbles (episode)
Series: TOS Season: 2 Original Airdate: 1967-12-29 Production Number: PROD NUM Year: 2267 Stardate: 4523.3 Story by: David Gerrold Directed by: Joseph Pevney The Enterprise is called to a station to deal with overbearing Federation officials, Klingons and tribbles. Summary The ''Enterprise'' is called to Deep Space Station K-7, where Kirk has to deal with overbearing Federation officials, Klingons... and little furry creatures called tribbles. Background Information * Star Trek would return to the events of this episode in the Star Trek: Deep Space Nine episode "Trials and Tribble-ations." *Bantam Books published a series of novelizations called "foto-novels," which took photographic stills from actual episodes and arranged word balloons and text over them, to create a comic book formatted story. The third installment was an adaptation of this episode. * James Doohan insisted on doing his own stunts. In the barroom brawl, he throws some very convincing punches. Jay Jones only doubled for him in a few brief fight sequences. * Shatner was being purposely hit on the head by the prop man with tribbles during production of the "buried in tribbles" scene. It took an incredible number of takes to get the avalanche of tribbles to fall just right. * Wah Chang designed the original tribbles. The hundreds of prop tribbles were sewn together during production using pieces of extra-long carpet. Some of them had mechanical toys placed in them so they could walk around. The original tribbles became sought-after collector's items, and quickly disappeared from the prop department. * The line in which Spock says that Kirk heard what Baris said, but could not believe his ears, was lifted directly from a Mad Magazine spoof of "Star Trek" that had just been published. * This is the only time in the series that Scott and Chekov have a conversation with one another. * Sound effects editor Douglas Grindstaff combined altered dove coos, screech owl cries and emptying balloons to create the tribble sounds. * The Enterprise miniature seen out of Lurry's window doesn't move, but if it was orbiting at the same speed the station was rotating, this would make sense. The ship seen out the window is another AMT model kit. In the 70s, AMT even offered a K-7 Space Station model kit, complete with a tiny Enterprise. Opticals of K-7 would be recycled in The Ultimate Computer. * Easily missed is Korax making fun of Scotty's accent: "Yerrrrright, ah shoooould." * Guy Raymond (the Bartender) also played a bartender in beer commercials during the 60s, in which he commented on the strange occurances in his bar! * Michael Pataki is another actor who guested in two series of "Star Trek", appearing in Too Short a Season on ST:TNG. * George Takei (Hikaru Sulu) does not appear in this episode. For a good chunk of the second season, he was filming "The Green Berets." Many scenes written for Takei were switched over to Walter Koenig. Links and References Guest Stars *William Schallert as Nilz Baris *William Campbell as Koloth *Stanley Adams as Cyrano Jones *Whit Bissell as Lurry *Michael Pataki as Korax *Ed Reimers as Admiral Fitzpatrick *Charlie Brill as Arne Darvin *Paul Baxley as Freeman *David L. Ross as Galloway (credited as guard) *Guy Raymond as the bartender *Eddie Paskey as Leslie (uncredited) *William Blackburn as Hadley (uncredited) *Roger Holloway as Roger Lemli (uncredited) *Frank da Vinci as Vinci (uncredited) *Dick Crockett as bald Klingon *Bob Orrison, Bob Miles, Richard Antoni as Klingon brawlers *Jerry Summers as Walter Koenig's stunt double *Jay Jones as James Doohan's stunt double *Phil Adams as Michael Pataki's stunt double References Antarean glow water; Burke, John; Canada; credit; Deep Space K-7; Denebian slime-devil (Deneb system); Donatu V; Earth; Earther; Federation-Klingon Cold War; general quarters; Jones, Cyrano; Klingons; Klingon Empire; Klingonese; Klingon spy; Koloth's ship; Organian Peace Treaty; parsec; quadrotriticale; Regulan bloodworm (Regulan system); Russia; Scotch whisky; Sherman's Planet; Spican flame gem; tribbles; triticale; vodka. Chronology *2067 *2268 Trouble With Tribbles, The de:Kennen Sie Tribbles? nl:The Trouble with Tribbles